El Niño/Southern Oscillation (ENSO) is the most well-known phenomenon influencing the
global climate variability at inter annual time scales. The term El Niño refers to the largescale
ocean-atmosphere climate phenomenon linked to a periodic warming in sea surface
temperatures across the central and east-central equatorial Pacific (between approximately
the International Date line and 120 degrees west longitude), and thus represents the warm
phase of the ENSO, and is sometimes referred to as a Pacific warm episode. The opposite of
which is La Niña, a cold phase of ENSO. Given the large size of the Pacific Ocean, changes in the sea surface temperature patterns and gradients across the basin influence atmospheric
circulation with pronounced impacts on global tropical precipitation and temperature patterns.
Building evidence of the links between ENSO driven climate anomalies and infectious diseases,
particularly those transmitted by insects, the knowlodgment could allow providing improved
long range forecasts of an epidemic or epizootic.